EARLY CHILDHOOD LEARNING & THE MEDIA ENVIRONMENT PRIYA S. NAYAR MEDIA EDUCATION LAB

1. EARLY CHILDHOOD LEARNING & THE MEDIA ENVIRONMENT PRIYA S. NAYAR MEDIA EDUCATION LAB

2. What about children and their interaction with the media environment? Where do we begin? How do we begin looking at media influences? Can we even make sense of media education for early childhood?

3. “Far from being mere unfinished adults, babies and young children are exquisitely designed by evolution to change and create, to learn and explore.” Alison Gopnik How Babies Think?!

4. Video LinksGood Babies and Talking Babies Twins “Talking” to Each Other: http://youtu.be/_JmA2ClUvUY Allison Gopnik http://youtu.be/TVRnbkHyXYk TED Talk on “The Birth of a Word” http://www.ted.com/talks/deb_roy_the_birth_of_a_word.html

5. In New York schools: Stephen Wise, Waldorf and Trevor Day Schools – what are the different perspectives of Media Use in Early Childhood Care?

6. At the Stephen Wise ECC, the focus is on documenting... “Children are not distracted by the physical environment, instead the environment is utilized for learning… We document everything and the kids are used to being photographed!”Teacher at Stephen Wise ECC as she takes pictures

7. Stephen Wise ECC, New York City http://ecc.swfs.org/

8. Waldorf Schools function as a “Media Free” environment. A Waldorf School writes, “The school’s efforts to foster students’ healthy emotional development and meaningful relationships with their environment are undermined by those encounters with media that separate children from authentic experience and promote a distorted, developmentally inappropriate and consumerist view of the world.” Media Policy 

9. Waldorf Schools, Media Policies http://www.waldorfgarden.org/index.aspx http://www.waldorfgarden.org/curriculum/preschool.aspx

10. Trevor Day School Administrator tells me that they consciously monitor use of media, utilizing media tools for learning from the beginning… “Our Nursery media use that I can think of are CD’s and DVD’s…for language learning and other educational videos”

11. Trevor Day School, NYC Technology at Trevor Day School: http://www.trevor.org/podium/default.aspx?t=117933

12. Developmental Ability In an interview with a Teacher’s Union representative, she exclaims that “…children do not need to be exposed to media. What they need is a relationship with their teacher!”

13. In Simple Language • Media Education for early childhood is not instructional, it must be interactive and allow children the “listening space” • Experiential learning can (and should) include media tools - media education does not replace a teacher-student relationship! • Teachers need to be educated on what media education is about, how it can be incorporated in an early childhood setting, what are the benefits of providing these tools… these questions need statistically backed up answers

14. In my research, my readings and discussions it is clear that early childhood teaching / learning is about developmental theories. Children are expected to learn socializing, they are expected to understand commands and wait their turn…

15. The idea that children who are not introduced to media at an early age are “missing” a key element in their educational tool box is still pretty alien to most teachers I spoke with.